Practice Area: Consumer And Retail

DENIELLE PEMBERTON-HEARD, ESQ.

General Counsel and Managing Director

DENIELLE PEMBERTON-HEARD, ESQ.

General Counsel and Managing Director

Denielle Pemberton-Heard is the General Counsel and Managing Director for Diversified Search, based in the firm’s Washington, DC office. She joined Diversified in 2018 following fifteen years as Group Counsel, Programming and Business Affairs at the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS), the nation’s largest non-commercial media enterprise. There, she directed transactional work related to the production, distribution, and syndication of content across all platforms on behalf of PBS and its 300-plus member stations, and led negotiations between and among PBS, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, on-air talent, program funders, and foundations. Before joining PBS, she served as Group Counsel for Thales, Inc., a French-owned communications concern, and as Vice President, Legal and Business Affairs at Time Life. She has also held in-house positions at Discovery Communications, Inc.

She began her law career in private practice with Connecticut’s Wiggin and Dana, and was subsequently associated with the New York firm of Cowan Liebowitz and Latman, where she focused on intellectual property litigation. Pemberton-Heard also serves as a senior advisor to STEMconnector, a Diversified Search company committed to increasing the number of STEM-ready workers in the global talent pool through its work with pioneering leaders across more than 200 organizations.

An alumna of the Columbia Graduate School of Business, she has served as a Regional Judge for Presidential Commission White House Fellowships; as a Trustee of the Toy Industry of America Foundation; and on the Board of Governors of the Case Western School of Law. Pemberton-Heard has also served on the professional faculty of the Johns Hopkins University Carey School of Business, where she has lectured on business law.

PRACTICE AREAS

KELLY KEOUGH

Kelly Keough is a Research Associate at Diversified Search, joining the firm in 2018. She works primarily in the consumer and retail, energy and natural resources, and industrial sectors.

Keough boasts a deep knowledge of Latin America. She studied in Bolivia and has written extensively on Latin American business, politics, and culture. A native Spanish speaker, she also has broad experience as translator and served as an intern for the America Society/Council of the Americas, where she prepared policy briefs for the senior director as well as providing logistical support and event planning assistance for various programs and forums.

EDUCATION

PRACTICE AREAS

SEAN LEE

Managing Director

Sean Lee is a Managing Director in the San Francisco office of Diversified Search, where he works primarily in the Healthcare, Life Sciences, Consumer and Retail, Education, and Nonprofit sectors. With more than 10 years of global search experience, he has successfully completed leadership searches for organizations facing changing business climates and significant transformation. He joined the firm in 2018.

Prior to joining Diversified Search, Lee was Head of Executive search at Blue Shield of California, a $17 billion healthcare organization. Lee most recently worked as Head of Talent Acquisition for Marin Health, a health system based in the Northern California. Lee’s in-house experience on both the payor and provider side focused on innovative leadership that leveraged disruptive technologies and services to transform the healthcare ecosystem.

Lee began his search career in 2009 as a Managing Director at at a global boutique search firm headquartered in Singapore. Based in the U.S. and Asia-Pacific, his clients included large integrated healthcare systems and multinational corporations in the consumer and hospitality industries. Throughout his search career, Lee has worked with numerous organizations undergoing mergers and acquisitions. Additionally, Lee continues to serve both domestic and global private equity and venture capital clients as an executive search partner to their portfolio companies.

Prior to his search career, Lee worked in fundraising for the University of California, Davis, his alma mater.

PRACTICE AREAS

KYUNG H. YOON

Senior Advisor

Kyung H. Yoon is a Senior Advisor at Diversified Search, joining the firm in 2018 and working primarily in the technology and consumer and retail sectors, with a particular emphasis on CEOs and boards. A former vice chairman of Heidrick & Struggles, Yoon is the CEO and founder of the Silicon Valley-based Talent Age Associates, where she has developed talent strategies for the Fortune 500, multinational corporations, and mid-cap/venture-backed companies in the technology, fashion, consumer, lifestyle, and financial sectors.

While at Heidrick, Yoon led the firm’s expansion in Asia, managing its Singapore, Tokyo, Hong Kong, Taipei, Shanghai, and Seoul offices. At Diversified Search, she works closely on cross-border search work through the firm’s membership in AltoPartners, the leading international alliance of retained executive search and leadership consulting firms.

Prior to joining Heidrick, Yoon served as President of Benten Investments, Inc., in San Francisco; President of Pacific Union Management in San Francisco; and Vice President of Dillingham Development Co. in Honolulu. She began her career at BNP Paribas. She is also the Co-Founder and Partner of the Executive Board Exchange (EBX), the premier community for corporate director and board engagement. She currently serves as a board director of the global fashion group MCM Worldwide, board director of Give2Asia, council member of the Stanford Center on Longevity, and as an advisory board member of Translink Capital. Previously, she served on the boards of Silicon Valley Bank; several venture-backed technology companies, including Mobile Money Ventures (a joint venture between Citi and SK Telecom); and several nonprofits, including Harvard University’s Kennedy School Women’s Leadership Board. Born in Seoul, Korea to a diplomatic family, she grew up in Seoul, Washington, D.C., and Paris, and is fluent in English, French, and Korean, with literacy in Mandarin Chinese and Spanish.

PRACTICE AREAS

CHRIS BERGER

Managing Director

Chris Berger joined Diversified Search in 2017 to co-lead the firm’s Human Resources practice, after seven successful years as co-owner of the successful boutique HR executive search firm RomanoBerger LLC. Berger brings close to 20 years of executive search experience focused in the Human Resources arena, and 10 years in HR on the corporate side. He has completed hundreds of senior executive search assignments across all functional areas of human resources and across multiple industry sectors. His clients have ranged from Fortune 50 multinationals to startups.

Berger entered the executive search profession in 1999 when he was recruited into Korn/Ferry International’s Human Resources practice, and quickly became a leading member of the execution team. Several years later, he co-founded the Human Resources practice at TMP Worldwide (later Highland Partners). When TMP was acquired by Heidrick & Struggles, Berger was recruited to further develop the HR practice at CTPartners.

Berger began his career at May Department Stores, completing the company’s highly regarded Executive Training Program. He served briefly as an assistant buyer before entering human resources, where he led merchant training, corporate communications, college relations, and executive recruiting for a May division. In 1995, he was recruited by Melville/CVS Corporation, where, as HR Generalist, he recruited leadership roles before becoming Vice President of Corporate Human Resources and Staffing. Berger was briefly recruited back to the corporate side during his search career to become head of the executive recruiting for insurance giant Aetna.

J. VERONICA BIGGINS

Managing Director

The leader of the firm’s Board practice, J. Veronica Biggins brings more than 15 years of search experience to the firm—including several years working in the White House.

Biggins served as Assistant to the President of the United States and Director of Presidential Personnel under Bill Clinton, a role that tasked her with selecting and hiring all political appointees within the federal government. She worked directly with the President on appointments at all levels of the administration, including the placement of agency heads, ambassadors, and members of presidential boards and commissions.

Biggins has also served as Vice-Chairman of the U.S. Delegation to the United Nations Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing. She also served as Chairman of the Czech Slovak American Enterprise Fund—a role that earned her a Points of Light Award from President George W. Bush for her leadership.

Biggins’ background also includes 20 years’ experience with NationsBank (now Bank of America) and its predecessor, The Citizens, and Southern National Bank. There, as Executive Vice President for Human Resources, she was one of the highest-ranking women in the banking industry.

JUDY BOREHAM

Managing Director

Judy Boreham is a Managing Director at Diversified Search, where she manages a broad range of clients including those in the corporate and nonprofit sectors. As co-leader of the firm’s Human Resources practice, she specializes and is engaged in placing senior executives at the local, regional, national, and global level, and has gained expansive experience covering a wide variety of human capital related roles including CHRO, compensation/total rewards, talent acquisition and development, learning and development, organizational development, workforce planning, shared services, and business partnering assignments with such clients as LabCorp, Ametek Inc., AstraZeneca, Radius Health, Barnabas Healthcare, and JM Huber.

Prior to joining Diversified Search in 1995, Boreham worked for a search firm in Central London serving the consumer market. Working with a portfolio of blue-chip international clients such as Kraft, Duracell, McKinsey, AC Nielson, Guinness, and SmithKline Beecham, she managed key business assignments across the United Kingdom.

Prior to her search career, Boreham held various business and marketing leadership positions with the largest and fastest-growing division of Baxter Healthcare, Inc., where she was responsible for launching a range of product lines that gained worldwide recognition, and more recently as Business Manager for the Critical Care division at Johnson & Johnson, where she was responsible for the development of a patient monitoring technology product in the provider healthcare space.

HUGO FUEGLEIN

Managing Director

Hugo Fueglein is a Managing Director in Diversified Search’s New York City office and is a core member of the Global CIO practice for Diversified Search. Fueglein is also a leading member of the Global Technology practice at Diversified Search, a role that has allowed him to place technology executives in key positions across all industries. He specializes in the placement of chief information officers, chief technology officers, and technology executives in IT architecture, IT infrastructure, application development, and IT operations.

Prior to joining Diversified Search, Fueglein was an Executive Vice President with DHR International, and formerly an integral member of the CIO and IT practice at CT Partners, where he served clients across industries, recruiting talent to fill critical roles in corporate technology functions. He has completed assignments for CIOs and key leadership positions in technology for a broad scope of clients that continuously utilize technology as a strategic initiative. Industry sectors he has served include technology, consumer goods, retail, energy, financial services, healthcare, pharmaceutical, manufacturing, and industrial.

Fueglein’s search career also includes being a Principal with both Korn/Ferry International and Morgan Samuels. During his seven-year tenure with Korn/Ferry, he was instrumental in the creation of the CIO Center of Expertise. Earlier in his career, he was an economist with Chase Econometrics and the Wharton Economic Forecasting Associates (WEFA) Group.

PRACTICE AREAS

JULIE KANAK

Managing Director

Julie Kanak serves as a Managing Director in the firm’s Chicago office, where she contributes expertise in global business, banking, and natural resources. She is active in the Industrial, Life Sciences, Consumer and Retail, and Natural Resources practices, as well as being a key member of the Board, CEO and CFO practices.

Prior to joining Diversified Search, Kanak spent four years with a leading global search firm and boutique global agribusiness firm. That work complemented her 26 years in banking and corporate finance, where she principally focused on agribusiness, food, and energy. The bulk of her global corporate and investment banking career was spent as North American head of AgriFoods at Credit Agricole Corporate and Investment Bank. Her career also includes more than 10 years as a global banker and senior executive with Australia and New Zealand Banking Group, and State Bank of South Australia in New York and Chicago.

PRACTICE AREAS

MARJORIE KEAN

Managing Director

Marjorie Kean is a Managing Director in the Miami office of Diversified Search and the leader of the Consumer and Retail practice. Her practice is focused on the Latin American and U.S. Hispanic markets, and the majority of her clients are Fortune 1,000 multinational corporations.

Although she has experience in a vast number of industries, she has particular expertise in the areas of consumer products, telecommunications, retail, fast foods, life sciences, banking, and entertainment. Her current focus is on pan-regional searches.

Kean is formerly a Managing Director with Edward W. Kelly and Partners, which was acquired by Diversified in 2008. Prior to that, she served as Managing Director of the Caracas office of Korn/Ferry before becoming head of its Miami office. Kean lived in Mexico for 10 years and Venezuela for 16 years. In the latter location, she helped open Korn/Ferry’s Colombia and Puerto Rico offices.

EDUCATION

PRACTICE AREAS

KEVIN B. KELLY

Managing Director

With more than 20 years in executive search, Kevin B. Kelly is a Managing Director in our Atlanta office and co-leads the firm’s Industrial practice. He conducts senior-level assignments in general management, finance, sales and marketing, operations, security, and other functions for clients in the industrial and consumer sectors. Kelly is also an active member of the firm’s Board practice, and also works with private equity firms and their portfolio companies.

Prior to joining Diversified Search, Kelly was Executive Vice President & Managing Director with Slayton Search Partners, with oversight responsibility for the firm’s Atlanta and Washington, D.C. offices. Earlier, he spent 13 years with Russell Reynolds Associates, where he was a Partner in the firm and managed its Atlanta office.
Before entering the executive search, Kelly pursued a career in marketing and advertising, most recently in account service with the Atlanta ad agency Cole Henderson Drake. Earlier, he spent several years in marketing with the Coca-Cola Company. He began his career in the management training program at Universal Leaf Tobacco.

PRACTICE AREAS

JAMES A. LANGSTON

Managing Director

Jim Langston is a Managing Director and leader of the Financial Officers practice at Diversified Search. After beginning his career in public accounting, Langston spent eight years with Prudential Financial in audit, finance, and treasury operations. He later founded a consultancy providing succession and estate plans for business owners and high-net-worth individuals and families. His executive search career began in 1995 with an at-that-time boutique firm—now Kenexa—where he was instrumental in starting their retained Financial Officers practice. He was later a Managing Director with both Heidrick & Struggles and Korn/Ferry, continuing to focus on Financial Officer searches. Although his business has often focused on Fortune 1,000 clients, working at the director, VP, and C-suite levels, he also works with international early-stage and venture-backed organizations to identify and recruit world-class management talent.

Langston’s process is built on his varied and unique business experience. Using a consultative approach, insight, and intuition to understand an organization’s dynamics and operating environment, he identifies leadership that is best suited to its particular needs. Having built management teams for both domestic and international clients, he has been retained by such premier global clients as Genworth Financial, IMS Health, Sun Life Financial, Cisco, AmeriHealth Caritas, EMC, Saint Gobain, Ascension Health, Drexel University, and Cigna.

Prior to joining the field of executive search, Leng was a board member of three public companies and CEO of a $600 million public company. Prior to that, he ran a $1 billion division of a telephone company focused on corporate users and had responsibility for all data services and networking products. While at the telephone company, he was founder and chairman of its ISP and a board member of its two-million-subscriber cell phone subsidiary.

Leng uses his operating experience from being a CEO, financial background as a CPA and CA, and technical knowledge from the work that he has done for tech companies to drill down and understand at a nuanced level what his clients are seeking to achieve as they build their teams. He has written numerous papers on technology leadership and the challenges facing technology leaders today and authors a blog, Resources for the Modern CIO, at tonyleng.com.

The core of Leng’s consulting has been with senior leaders who are seeking to transform their organizations as they face a future of rapid change, digitization, regulation, shifting markets, and increasingly connected and informed customers.

For the past 12 years, Leng has facilitated the Fisher CIO Forum, a monthly venue where CIOs and CTOs discuss topics of relevance in their daily lives, and which affords such leaders the opportunity to develop a close network to discuss current challenges in a peer group environment on a confidential basis. Participating companies in the Forum have included Blue Shield, Clorox, Cost Plus, Delta Dental, Dignity Health, Esurance, Facebook, FitBit, Franklin Templeton, Gap, Genentech, Kaiser Permanente, Levi Strauss, McKesson, Macys.com, Matson, Mulesoft, Okta, PG&E, Restoration Hardware, Ross Stores, Safeway, Salesforce.com, Schwab, Splunk, Uber, VMWare, and Williams-Sonoma, among others.

JOHN MESTEPEY

Managing Director

John Mestepey is the Managing Director of the Miami Office of Diversified Search. Earlier, he ran the Miami Office of Edward Kelley & Partners, and for 19 years was the Managing Director of the Miami Office of A.T. Kearney Executive Search.

Mentioned as one of the top 250 executive search professionals in the U.S. in “The New Career Makers,” Mestepey has focused his practice on key management assignments at the Board of Directors, CEO, COO and CFO levels across many industries, including the restaurant, retail, consumer products, financial services, healthcare, higher education, travel and leisure, technology, and biopharmaceutical sectors, among others.
Mestepey began his career in recruiting with AETNA Life & Casualty, where he was Director of Recruiting. He later co-led the in-house executive search firm, Career Development Corporation, at Lincoln National.

Following university, Mestepey was commissioned a Second Lieutenant in the U.S. Marine Corps, and served a tour in Vietnam, where he was a rifle platoon and rifle company commander. He was awarded the Purple Heart.
He is a trustee of the Board of Directors of the Greater Miami Chamber of Commerce and a member of the Orange Bowl Committee.

EDUCATION

PRACTICE AREAS

TRACY M. O’SUCH

Managing Partner

Tracy Murdoch O’Such is a Managing Partner in the New York office of Diversified Search. Her responsibilities include the management of the firm’s New York office and its global Digital, Media, Entertainment, and Sports practice. She has extensive experience in executive search as well as direct industry experience in large media conglomerates.

Before joining Diversified Search, O’Such opened and managed the New York office for OdgersBerndtson. Prior to Odgers, Tracy founded and served as President of, LexMedia Solutions, a retained executive recruitment firm specializing in media industries. Previously, she was with Cablevision Systems Corporation, where she built the first in-house executive recruitment department. In 1997, O’Such established the Global Entertainment, New Media & Sports practice for Norman Broadbent International, a London-based search firm. She began her career in search with Bishop Partners, a New York-based media search firm. Earlier, she worked in sales and marketing in the entertainment, cable, communications, and publishing industries.

The convergence of the media, technology, and sports industries has broadened her client base to include Comcast, ESPN, WWE, Charter Communications, IMG, and Competitor Group, among many others. Her functional areas of expertise include chief digital officers, chief revenue officers, and executives working in corporate communications, branding, and advertising.

EDUCATION

PRACTICE AREAS

MARIE SAVARD, MD

Physician Advisor

Dr. Marie Savard is Physician Advisor in Diversified Search’s Healthcare Services practice, and co-leads the Physician Services practice within it. A trusted voice in women’s health, she is an internationally recognized internal medicine physician, health educator, and speaker on women’s health, patient empowerment, and collaborative doctor-patient partnerships. She is the author of four bestselling books on personal health management and wellness.

As a former corporate medical director of a leading long-term care provider, Dr. Savard brings a deep expertise in the design and development of post-acute care, affordable senior housing, and population-based care. As an RN and MD, she has a personal interest in the emerging integrated models of care delivery and the need for more interdisciplinary team-based clinical leaders to support them. As an advocate for patient empowerment, she brings a crucial perspective to the need for outcomes management, evidenced-based decision-making, and the value of personal health records, patient safety, and personal health management.

Formerly, Dr. Savard was the director of the Center for Women’s Health and Associate Professor at the Medical College of Pennsylvania. She was Technical Advisor to the United Nation’s Fourth World Conference on Women, and served on the American Board of Internal Medicine’s Subcommittee on Clinical Competency in Women’s Health. Previously, she was Director of Quality Management at Pennsylvania Hospital, and has been a health columnist for Woman’s Day magazine. She is currently a part-time contributor for ABC News.

PRACTICE AREAS

KIM WALKER

Vice President and Senior Associate

Kim Walker is a Vice President and Senior Associate with Diversified Search. She has over 16 years of recruiting experience as a multi-industry specialist in the consumer products, industrial, manufacturing, education, life sciences, financial services, and healthcare sectors, and has placed leaders in numerous Fortune 500 companies.

Walker began her search career with Ray & Berndtson Executive Search. She then spent five years in recruitment management with KPMG, one of the “Big Four” accounting firms, focusing on critical experienced hire needs. She moved back into retained executive search with A.T. Kearney, and, prior to joining Diversified Search, worked for Carlyle Group and The Dow Group.

EDUCATION

PRACTICE AREAS

CARLA Y. LOGAN

Vice President and Senior Associate

Carla Logan is a Vice President and Senior Associate in the Atlanta office of Diversified Search. She has more than 15 years of experience in executive search in the industries of consumer-packaged goods, retail, transportation, financial services, and more.

As a Senior Associate, Logan collaborates with members of the search team to execute the search. Her responsibilities include search strategy development, direct candidate recruitment, and development. Utilizing various internal and external resources, she also contributes to business development by providing detailed market analysis and company information.

Before coming to Diversified, Logan spent 12 years as a Senior Associate with Heidrick & Struggles. Prior to that, she was the Project Manager for the boutique research firm Innovative Search LLC, where she was responsible for business development, client management, and candidate development.

Logan began her career executing C-suite search assignments for Fortune 500 corporations with Egon Zehnder International.

PRACTICE AREAS

JOYCE ORT

Vice President and Senior Associate

Joyce Ort has deep experience in executive search, with a proven track record of successful candidate development, sourcing, strategy, and research. She has conducted executive-level searches for premier companies across the consumer, industrial, technology, professional services, and life sciences industries in Canada, the U.S., and Latin America.

Before coming to Diversified, Ort worked as a consultant and analyst in the Technology & Business Professional Services practice for A.T. Kearney Executive Search. Prior to that, she worked for Ray & Berndtson as Coordinator in Research, supporting its Global Technology Practice.